


Vlinders, Butterflies, In The Sun

by Fangirl_Goon_Squad



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: AU-no serum, Artist Steve Rogers, Artists Are Weird, CYA Soldier, Completely Non-Canon, Feels, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Smut, M/M, Separation, Skinny Steve, Steve Stays Home, War wounds, bucky goes to war
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-09
Updated: 2017-04-26
Packaged: 2018-10-16 19:49:03
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 11
Words: 14,251
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10578291
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fangirl_Goon_Squad/pseuds/Fangirl_Goon_Squad
Summary: AU in which Steve does not attempt to enlist, but Bucky gets drafted.  A series of little vignettes; snapshots from the lives that might have been, like skips of a stone on still water.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Now for the SUPER SCARY part...my first fanfic post EVER.
> 
> I am a relentless self-editor, so absolutely PLEASE tell me if you find a punctuation, spelling, word use, or grammar error. They drive me mad, so the sooner they're fixed the better. It's going to be rare for me to post any part of an incomplete work, mostly due to my tendency to suddenly think of a scene or entire chapter that needs wedged in somewhere.
> 
> I thought I'd sit down and write a cute little period-piece fluffy bit of minor smut. Eleven chapters later, here we are.

Chapter 1:

“Got a question for me, then, Stevie?” There had to be _some_ reason the scrawny blond was willing to brave the humid, pollen-heavy air. Usually Rogers spent most of the summer indoors, but this time he'd insisted they meet in a thick patch of woods in an unpopular park.

“Yeah, an' I pinched a pint of cheap courage to make sure I'd ask,” he grinned crookedly, while fishing the bottle from a trousers pocket. Bucky accepted the silent offer, ignoring the rough burn down his throat in favor of how he should absolutely **not** be looking at his best friend. Sure, people said all the time how Steve would've made such a pretty girl, with his slim frame and fine-spun golden hair and that sweet grin and his amazing eyes. Saying Rogers had blue eyes was woefully short of the truth; his eyes were blue, all right, but when he was happy they looked bright as the summer sky and when he was sick they went dull and greyish and when he was angry Barnes could swear they were the cold color of a blued-steel gun barrel. No, he really _absolutely_ should not be looking at his best friend like this, not ever, not seeing these details, never watching for so long that he could tell the blond had already had at least two big swigs out of the bottle just by how he was moving.

But the one friend the brunet truly trusted then started Bucky's day down a dangerous path, stepping close until he could get up on his toes to kiss the taller man. And there was nothing brotherly about it—when surprise kept him a bit too still, Steve bit his lower lip, taking the kiss to dizzyingly deep when that nip had the desired effect of provoking a failed attempt to protest out loud. They were still from the shoulders down for a long few minutes, surprised but enjoying the taste and feel of one another way too much. Steve outright gasped like he'd been slapped when Barnes pulled away at last. It wasn't just the cheap hooch that roughened his voice a little...but there was the flash of quicksilver bewilderment, the moment wondering how the hell anyone like Rogers, who had just about zero practice with any kind of human intimacy that didn't involve his tendency to catch pneumonia the way some guys caught fly balls, was so very, very good at such an intimate thing.

“Ain't heard a question yet, punk.” Thank God, not the rejection the smaller man had dreaded.

“Ain't asked yet,” the blond retorted...while deftly undoing Bucky's belt and pants. “About that time, though.” He grinned more wickedly that anyone who knew him would expect; with those long, graceful artist's hands of his Rogers was already slowly, carefully stroking a cock that sure felt like everything he'd ever unwisely fantasized. Hot to the touch, hard enough to drive a railroad spike, and big enough that if he ever did this again Rogers would definitely end up needing both hands to do right by the only real friend he'd ever had. Oh, it had _absolutely_ been worth the risk, swiping that pint bottle...just to see that slow-burning ecstasy start to rise into the other man's expression.

And, of course, as long as they'd been inseparable, there had been occasional glimpses here and there so it wasn't as if the blond didn't know his best friend was, as the rough women he sometimes sketched while they hung around lowlife bars put it, hung like a stud horse.

“Wanna help me test a theory, Bucky?” Steve whispered slowly.

“Maybe...Oh my God, Steve, _your hands_...I never...what theory?” He finished on a gasp when Rogers flicked a thumb across the head of his dick, then started spreading Barnes's own slick heat around a little at a time. No danger in the world could have convinced the blond not to watch his face then, half-lidded eyes with blown pupils like Barnes was high on something, that lovely sweet mouth of his a little open as he panted, and the way he bit his lip to hold in the noises, all of it worth the risks.

“I think all the years of horrid medications might have burned out my gag reflex,” Steve purred. Then he sank to his bony knees and let his best friend's cock slip past his still kiss-slick lips. And when the tip of his nose reached Bucky's belly in one slow try, he hummed a low, rolling, ecstatic little noise, telling himself it was to reassure them both that his airways were clear.

It was all the brunet could do to keep from screaming like a man being murdered.

He did manage to choke it back to a disappointed moan when Rogers ever so **excruciatingly** slowly pulled back, looking up with just the same dangerous little grin that normally accompanied his ill-chosen motto of 'I can do this all day', usually the last thing he said before blood hit the walls and Bucky waded in to the rescue.

"Kinda thought so,” the little asthmatic jackass mused softly, not getting up. Barnes, usually ready on any spot with a library's worth of sweet-talk, only panted still, eyes nearly shut, hands jammed in his pockets all the way up to the knobby spots at his wrists, the pulse in his throat roaring like a jackhammer. “You want me to stop, Buck?” It took a long few seconds to register that the question was not a tease.

“ **God** help me, Stevie, _no_. Right now all I want in the wide world is for you to get that wicked sweet mouth back on my cock. I hope I taste half as good as you fee...fee...feel...” Clearly, according to the smaller of them, he did taste very good. Barnes was suddenly very glad that somehow, sometime in the last five minutes he'd gotten backed up into a fairly smooth-barked tree he was all too happy to lean back on.

And after that he didn't say anything comprehensible for a while, and with every bit of will he could scrape together he kept his hands in his pockets out of the fear that if they got loose of his good sense his voice would inevitably follow. Eventually, while Rogers was genuinely loving the feel of smooth fine skin sliding against every part of his mouth, the heat of Bucky's thunder-driven blood in the oh so hard shaft, the veining just starting to pop up under every move the blond tried with his exquisitely talented tongue, all Barnes could do was moan on every exhale, letting the words blur together because he had no choice. _“OhGodSteve, OhhhStevie”_ over and over again just barely more than a whisper until he went quiet once more for a long moment, starting to quiver here and there.

“God, Stevie, you...oh God...might wanna...so good, damn you feel so good...you better duck...Oh God I **can't** —” he choked off suddenly, and they both knew what that meant. But Steve was terrified into depths he hadn't known he held in himself that the merciless, pitiless, relentless horrors of any of the big European fronts would send him back nothing of his beautiful best friend but the empty clatter of a set of dog tags. It was time for Barnes to see all of a previously meticulously hidden side of scrawny, frail Stevie, _his_ Stevie and damn what the whole world thought for just this one stolen fragment of a day. Time for the impressively independent young soon-to-be soldier to feel what it could be like to be loved, cherished, _needed_ so much by one very specific person.

It took **both** of Steve's narrow, bony, messily slick hands to stifle the noise Bucky tried to make when he came while Rogers once again had the tip of his nose pressed to that flat, fluttery low belly.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nope, didn't forget. Hopefully this chapter is error-free, because I got stuck in a scheduling crunch on Upload Day. Next week I'll be adding 2 further chapters that are quite short. Not sure when the first one's going up, but it looks like Sunday mornings will be Upload Days for the rest of this fic, barring emergencies on my end. Comments welcome :) I could probably be convinced to speed up the final beta & upload schedule, even.

They were grateful for a rare pea-soup fog that awful day. Steve was memorizing every line and detail; eventually he would have a dozen sketches from this morning that he would combine into the basis of a career-making painting he called _Leaving Home Meant Leaving Us_. Bucky, the fog hiding the bags he was trying to keep track of as well as the tracks of tears from the night before and the long walk to this bitter end, hadn't exactly been talkative or cuddly. When a particularly thick wall of vapor closed them off from the world, Rogers stole a quick, gentle, dry kiss, their first and only intimate touch of any kind since the afternoon in the park. Somehow, even in private, they had managed to keep their everything to themselves, unwilling to even talk it over with Barnes's departure looming.

“Stevie, you gotta make me a promise. A real one. Ironclad. No wiggles out, no loopholes, no grey areas.” His beloved voice was rough from all the crying he would only do in private. Barnes was a patriot, that much everyone knew, but what truly terrified him about going to war was going without Rogers, living without him, maybe dying without him. Maybe coming home after the whole damn war to find the only conversations they'd ever have again would be Bucky, alone, talking to a headstone.

“Anything I can, Buck.” Only a whisper, but his voice too was cracking. “You know I don't do grey areas anywhere but a sheet of paper, jerk.”

“You _cannot_ get yourself too hurt or too sick while I'm gone, punk. You remember that gal I been dancin' with, the redhead with all the cousins?” Their wonderful woodland afternoon had indeed led to a pollen-induced asthma attack that had kept Rogers in bed two days hacking up impossible amounts of crap from his damaged lungs, but neither regretted it. Meanwhile, the sweet-talking handsome playboy Steve's friend had grown into had been keeping up his usual romantic activities, out and about every night he could afford it...less and less often with his favorite friend at his side as the blond had grown tired of feminine disdain on double dates.

“Yeah...Helena? That it?”

“Yup, her. Well...I talked to her the day I got my letter. I want you to stay with them until my tour's up.”

Rogers was aghast. “How could I possibly not get torn apart, the only guy in a house fulla gals?”

“Steve, you ever wonder why it's an all-girl boarding house?”

“None of my business.”

“It is now. I talked to Helena and she said I can tell you because you won't talk it around town. That whole place is fulla girl _queers_ , Steve. That's what 'cousin' means to them, the family your heart loves instead of the one bloodlines gave you. They'll keep you safe for me, hide you, keep you outta the poorhouse and worse places. I didn't tell them about you...the day in the woods. They just know I want you safe, and Helena says that's something that can happen. When I get home...we'll figure out a way, figure something out. Move us to a small town where the air's good, you can be a reclusive sickly artist and I'll be your live-in nurse. Anything, Stevie, I'll do **anything** to get home if you promise to rein in that temper. No fights you can avoid. No going out for sulky walks on rainy nights. Get help when you're sick, just promise me you'll be waiting wherever they let me put my boots back on American soil. I _need_ to know you're waiting for me, being careful, keeping the hope, my lodestone to point me home. My heart needs to know you love me back so I have reason to keep my own sorry ass alive out there. I need you till the end of the line, Stevie. Don't let yours end without me, all right?”

“Of course I love you back, Buck. Think maybe the other reason I can't get no traction with a dame is maybe they can smell the queer in me. Don't get me _wrong_ , dames are great, but I ain't dreamin' about what **any** girl's got when I wake up stuck to my sheets. Those dreams are all you, always have been. Guess I need you to the end of the line too. And yeah, I promise. No fights, no health risks I can avoid.” Wisely, when the whistle sounded and the conductor called out, Rogers melted into the cold rank-smelling fog before either of them could see the other cry.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> So, as promised, a mid-week short chapter with another to follow on Sunday. If anyone would like my upload speed to increase, let me know in the comments, because that could be managed. Meanwhile...

“You feelin' okay, Barnes?”

Bucky didn't even look up from his breakfast despite finding it even less appealing than usual. At first his only replies were a twitchy shrug and a noncommittal grunt.

“Been better,” he finally growled when the worried scrutiny didn't ease up. Close as they all were, this conversation was starting to feel weird even if it was with someone he figured he knew pretty well by now. “Why you so nosy today, anyway?”

“Y'don't _usually_ talk in your sleep unless you're sick or comin' down sick.” The wary look behind the slow words just about froze Bucky's blood; fuck him **dead** but this was exactly why he hated sharing sleeping spaces. No, he never did talk in his sleep unless he had a flu or a bad head cold and then God alone knew what might come out of his mouth. Now that he knew, he could feel the physical symptoms gathering steam. He'd be in the infirmary with the flu by sunset the next day for sure. Maybe it was the fever coming on, or maybe he had finally done something right, but he saw a glimmer of a hope... Maybe, a way even being out of his head sick could work in his favor while he harbored a secret that could get him killed by his own allies, maybe his own unit, if the right words reached the wrong ears.

“So what'd I go on about?” he deadpanned, still pretending to care about food because he knew it would be a rare treat to get one more meal down before the puking started—he wasn't nearly as fragile as his secret back home, but this wasn't his first bout of flu either, especially considering he was going to be on the tail end of an infectious wave that had already burned through the troops around him. His nonplussed attitude finally got him a crack in the other soldier's armor, a tiny snort and the crinkle of crow's feet with a small grin.

“You're a _dog_ , Barnes, always sayin' you got nobody back home. Name of Stevie, short for Stephanie I'd reckon.” And Bucky, after his specialized training, knew way better than to waste a clean shot at anything...including self-preservation. The Army had taught him much...how to kill with a single shot from afar or his bare hands up close, how to pull out bullets fired by lesser marksmen, how to lie like a cheap rug if that was the way to victory and survival. Whatever it took.

“That again? Damn. Well, yeah, I'm hopin' that's the home waiting for me.”

“So why don'tcha have a picture, or go around talkin' her up like all the other guys?”

“She won't sit for a photo. Hates the way she looks, poor kid's a train wreck. Spine ain't right, lungs ain't strong. Might not even be there when I get back. Guess I don't wanna jinx it, right? And she's not like proper ladies or fancy rich girls, really more of a tomboy with a wicked stubborn streak, but when I look in those big blue eyes I see my future there if I'm lucky. Listen, don't let anyone flip out if I babble while I'm sick and it sounds like I think I'm talkin' about some fella named Steve. I got a...third, I think?...cousin who's short, skinny, and blond like Stephanie, and his name's Steve. I've scared family members to the brink of calling a priest because I say the _weirdest_ shit when I come up with a fever. Hell, there was this one time I was in the hospital and I asked my mom how she got 'em to let her bring a live donkey to visit me. Turned out it was my aunt, and I'm not sure she ever forgave either of us.”

At last, a real laugh as he set to finishing his food before doing every useful chore he could manage before food was nearly as much an enemy as Nazis and then the fever came roaring in. As he'd planned, he worked himself to literal collapse, falling over unconscious while trying to deliver a situation report to a superior officer. The way the other men in his unit responded to him when he got out of the infirmary four days later told him his aim, as always now, had been spot on. Anything crazy (or worse) he might have said had clearly been brushed off as feverish babbling.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Super short one this time, probably the shortest in the work. If anybody would like the next chapter, which is 4 or 5 time the length, posted during the week, hit me up in the comments or by message!

Barnes nearly got run down twice before he could shut his slack jaw and get his war-weary ass out of the middle of the street. He stood at the edge of the yard staring at something that, however briefly, made pale all the horrors he'd seen overseas. All that had kept him going some days had been two memories: that crazy day out in the woods and the melancholy fog-bound morning he'd had to get on that train with his orders in hand, trying to look back but unable to see anything but fog and ghosts. Without visible warning, he crumpled into a fainted heap, overwhelmed by emotion and exhaustion alike. Dusk was drawing in, and he lay a long time totally unnoticed in the overgrown verge, his head instinctively pillowed on his tattered duffel bag.

Bucky had finally clawed his way home through hellfire and dirt turned to mud by blood instead of water, through screaming damnation and explosive terror and flying shrapnel. Some of that shrapnel had peppered him with an extensive spray of small scars he'd spent half the damn trip home wondering how Steve would react to seeing.

Despite half a dozen cables and handwritten letters, no one had met him when his plane finally touched down.

And the house where he'd left his future to await his uncertain return was a burned-out husk.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Well, I can see where this is going. Three weeks, four chapters, not one comment good or bad. I'm tired of shouting my artistic heart into the darkness for no reason after scraping together the courage left in the wake of a lifetime of being bullied over my creative impulses, but that doesn't mean I'll orphan a work I've committed to posting. Guess that 'unlikely to publish anything incomplete' is about all I've got in my favor as a writer, so I'll do what I can tonight before I have to take care of family and the rest will be up in the morning.

The next morning, he shook as much dirt and grass from his hair and battered uniform as he could, shouldered his duffel once more, and started aimlessly walking away from the heartbreaking sight of that gutted roofless building, its vertical beams turned to angry skyward-reaching claws, until the growling of his belly made him take note of his surroundings, including a diner. No one had bothered him much, not once they got a look into the hollow emptiness spreading behind his blue eyes, and he hoped his sorrow would keep building that wall, keep at bay an unwelcome world where no one had met him at the airport and he didn't even know where his reason for living had been buried, or if they'd found enough to bury, or how to find anyone who could tell him anything. He quickly settled in a booth in the back of the diner where he could keep his spine against a wall and spent nearly as much time warily eyeing the staff and other customers as he did looking at the menu, then just sat with his eyes nearly shut. When a chipper waitress stopped, he barely bothered to open his eyes while ordering steak, eggs, hash browns, and a lot of coffee. He hadn't even gotten the coffee yet when another waitress slipped into the other booth seat uninvited.

“ _James_ , is that you?” Now his big blue eyes came wide open, because the voice was achingly familiar. In her classy little uniform, a little makeup on and her hair pulled back, she might have been anyone—except that hair was an explosion of red-gold ringlets poorly contained by a bit of ribbon tied in a bow since she was still saving for good hair clips.

“ **Helena**!”

“Oh, my poor James...you look so sad and tired, like walking shell-shock my poor darlin' man. Got a place to sleep tonight?”

“Don't care. I told him to wait for me at the house, Helena.” She stopped him before the gloss in his eyes could spill over into tears as the hoarseness in his voice promised—nobody wanted a weeping veteran hanging around, customer or not, but he had to know right away.

“We got him out, James, we got him out the _second_ someone yelled 'fire'. We even got all his art stuff out too. I haven't seen him in over a year, but only Agatha and Rinalda died in the fire. Word is even though he's not consumptive, he's been rooming at a sanitarium and trying to go to art classes.”

“His ma _died_ of consumption—I gotta get him outta there!” Sarah Rogers had wheezed her last with only her son at the side of her sanitarium cot, but Barnes had been to that sickbed more than once alongside his friend. The thought of Steve having to go like that made his knees weak and his guts watery. It was almost as bad as what he'd already put himself through trying to wrap his mind around how much his heart suddenly felt like that burned-out building looked. _Like claws trying to rip the joy from the sky, like what war does to blacken the bones of hope..._ He'd jotted that one down before leaving, immortalizing it for later consideration in one of several dozen tiny notebooks jammed in among dirty laundry and a few other things that were all he currently owned in the world. Bucky would never have imagined himself a poet, not based on the stereotypes he'd learned in school about men who wrote pretty words for the sake of pretty words or artistic ideals. Spending some time working with a French unit and getting to be friends with the ones who spoke English had deeply altered his perception of words as art, but he had let absolutely no one see that in him yet, holding it dear for Steve to discover and appreciate with the joy he figured only a real artist would take in such an offering.

“You gotta eat some good American cooking first, soldier,” Helena said with a wink as she slid out of the booth to get back to work. With a glut of young, employable women in the city for most of the war it wasn't easy to find or keep a job, and there were whispers about the redhead maybe getting moved up a link on the chain of command soon so she was being extra-careful. “I'll be back for your breakfast dishes, and if they're empty enough to suit me I'll tell you the name of the art school.” She'd always been impertinent, and had nearly cried while out on a date with Bucky after he told her he regarded that as one of her most delightfully entertaining qualities. He stood out for that because most dates, boys or girls, kept telling her that particular quality was going to get her arrested or committed.

The dishes were practically licked clean in under ten minutes, but not solely due to her impertinence. Distantly Bucky realized this really was the first full meal he'd had since that terrible foggy morning that hadn't been a scrounged snack or Army rations. The school she named was half the damn borough away, and Barnes thought he might need a long walk to ready himself for whatever kind of wreckage he found—or didn't find—waiting. After all, Helena had said it'd been a year... Along the way, something in a store window caught his eye, causing him to rustle the pay in his pocket, jangling the coins slightly while the scanty few bills rubbed on each other between his fingers. After a little debate, he went inside.

An hour later he was back out on the sidewalk, the grime scrubbed from his face in the store bathroom, clean new shirt on his back under a gorgeous and warm pea-coat in vivid deep blue, made of merino wool, exactly the kind of thing he'd never been able to afford before the war. A long walk across half the borough later, he found the school. It was conveniently right across the street from a cute little park where a fresh-home veteran could have a quiet smoke undisturbed. Bucky didn't smoke often, but when he was stressed like this it made a good cover. Nothin' special for cops or muggers to look at here, just one more tired ex-soldier taking a break on his way who knew where. Pretty much all he had to his name on his back or in one durable bag that lay in the dirt near his feet, nobody the world at large needed to care about.

And then as if the smoke had summoned it, he heard a too-familiar sound, one that filled the gaping sinkhole that had tried to build itself into his very soul on his arrival home to find no welcome waiting on the tarmac. Feeling that yawning chasm stop trying to pull him under left Bucky a little dizzy, more so than the top-grade tobacco he was no longer used to after his tour. A soft cough with the booming echo that meant pneumonia was around the next corner was what he heard, so familiar that for once he forgot the sick lurch of fear it usually inspired immediately.

Barnes looked up from his cigarette and there was his scrawny little muse just leaving the building, pausing at the bottom of the stairs with his bent arm in front of his face for another of those quiet coughs underlaid by the sound the brunet knew was from a vibrating windpipe—a very bad sign indeed. So much need and so many unspoken words crowded each other so fast and hard that the soldier come home could neither move nor speak. Couldn't wave, or shout his joy to the sky, or even just break down in tears. In the end he thought it must have been the intensity of emotion that called out for him in place of the voice frozen under the stubble on his throat.


	6. Chapter 6

Rogers had been disappointed in himself all day, hell all _week_ , over some drawing techniques it was proving hard for him to master; they wanted him to use dusty charcoal despite the number of asthma attacks he was having in that class. Only a month in and it was already pure misery, with the rest of the term looking longer, not shorter, every hour he had to listen to the rich girls bitch about his wheezing and coughing. He was still in mid-hack when he just...stopped. The blue had caught the corner of his eye, and because it was a favorite shade he briefly entertained the idea of asking whoever that was in the park if he could draw them, a colored-pencil study for a painting maybe down the line. Then he realized the man in the oh-so-blue coat was watching him back and he flushed bright, feeling like he'd been caught window-peeping.

And at last he finally realized **why** the guy across the street was grinning at him, a vividly beautiful smile on those familiar fine-lined lips that was bracketed by the beginnings of little creases worn in by wartime strain despite his youth. Steve nearly dropped his entire valise and armload of extras from a long day of classes before he legged it across the side street. About ten feet shy of the weary but still smiling veteran, all the art supplies did get dropped on the bare dirt near the bench while their owner kept going until he could fling his arms around Bucky's neck and just sag into his steady warmth, shuddering with held-in tears and choked-off sobs. He thought briefly that when the time came he had to die, he could be at peace if he could just go with those strong arms around him, the musky and masculine smell he so loved wrapped around him like a cloak, the way the other man simply radiated the body heat he had always been willing to share. Rogers could have died in that single moment and been at peace, which was something he'd be a long time admitting. For a single lurching moment of rank terror, he did think he'd blurted it right out there on the street for any passing stranger to hear, but all that made it out of him was a low, wavering moan.

“Told you I'd come back if you were my lodestone, and I found my way right to you, didn't I,” Barnes murmured into a shivering shoulder, careful to keep his tone mellow when he could feel too many bones and hear the bubbling nightmare that was another lung infection. Then he rooted something out of a pocket, waiting patiently until Rogers had the upper hand over threatening tears. “Like iron filings and a magnet, we are. I only got back to New York yesterday. Lookit this, Stevie,” Bucky rasped quietly. “It's my medic insignia. I'm a fully trained wartime medic, and as such I'm totally ready to pull rank and **order** you not to sleep one more night in a fucking _sanitarium_ —are you insane now too? Living in all that sickness like you think you're invincible. Punk.”

“Only place that'd have me. No money, no friends but you after the fire cuz I lost track of all the girls. At least my room has its own outside door so I don't have to track through the halls. Only get to study because I busted my balls for a scholarship. But that's _all_ I busted while you were gone, Bucky, you made me promise and as God is my witness I did it! I never started one fight the whole time you were gone, and the couple that other people started around me I got the hell away from. I **promised** you. Jerk.”

“I believe you, for once, punk. And I **promised** you I'd come home and take care of you proper, and that starts with finding a real place to live, maybe somewhere close to here. A quiet apartment that a big burly veteran like me can keep clean for a fragile little artist who needs a nursemaid and about fifteen square meals.”

“Ain't got that kind of dough. Sanitarium's free.”

“I've got some pay with me—you think I stole this coat? And I got back pay comin' from the Army now I'm home. Not just grunt pay either, turns out I'm as good a sniper as I am a nursemaid so I get my rank base plus double specialty _plus_ hazard for the shooting. And maybe some wounded in action on top like frosting on a cake; don't gimme that look, if it'd been bad enough they'd have sent me home sooner. I'll get a job if I need to until the back pay shows up. Construction, courier, dishwasher, janitor, I don't fucking care as long as they pay me something for the work I do. It'll all be worth it every time I get to come home to you. I don't even care where home turns out to be. I've...we've...got that back pay to think about, ya know. We could go...anywhere.”

“First I gotta go home,” Steve choked, still clinging, still with that quiet but liquid cough with the booming undertone you wouldn't think his chest had room for to start with.

“Great plan. Come on. We're gonna go find a place, then you're gonna rest, relax, and let me go get anything you left at the sanitarium.”

“Buck, I been on my own the whole time you were gone. I can make it one more night.” The slow and haunted look that got him would inspire more than one painting.

“Stevie...leave it to you...” Barnes sighed, his grin into the smaller man's amusement slow to rise, but he skipped any of a dozen ways to finish that sentence. “I can't.”

“You can't what?”

“Make it one more fucking night alone anywhere in the whole wide world, punk.”

And that was all it took for Rogers to cave in like wet sand. “All right, jerk, find us a place to live.”


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> One of the longer chapters. Not sure why the chapter counter isn't working--I keep telling it the chapter total is 11.

It took some walking and some of Bucky's enviable smooth talking, but by nightfall they had a little 2-bedroom sublet with its own bathroom, scrubbed clean and with worn-down dressers and bare beds included. Barnes paid two months of rent up front, piled as much of anything fabric he could spare onto the bed his friend claimed, and then darted out to go find something approximating dinner.

When he came back, the first thing he heard was the slow gurgle that was Rogers's sleeping breath, so one helping of dinner would have to wait.

What made him wish he had a single artistic fiber for anything but words anywhere in his being was finding the tiny blond had kicked almost everything off the bed except for that exquisite merino pea-coat, which was more than big enough to cover everything below his chin when he curled up tight like that.

Bucky went back out the next morning, found the shop, and after much guesswork about tailoring measurements brought home another blue merino pea-coat for Steve; Barnes had a good eye and had learned the metric system while overseas, and the smaller coat fitted as perfectly as if it had been assembled on its owner. Both of them quickly fell into the habit of rolling the coats up inside-out to use as pillows, and when Rogers got sick he tended to steal the bigger one for a blanket while its owner was gone on errands. For the first few days of their tenure as roommates, Steve was just sick enough to be a little out of it all the time but not so bad that they needed to find a pharmacy. The other man was weirdly grateful for this interlude when everything felt so...nostalgic, in strange ways. He'd taken care of sickly, frail Steve for a really long time before the war, and later would reflect that having to fall back into those routines not only gave him time to heal emotionally, it put him in a situation where he had all the time in the world to think about oh so many things.

Things like getting a job. He for sure was not about to go back to any sanitarium after having retrieved Steve's things, and he didn't want a hospital job either. He'd seen way too much horror, mutilation, and sickness overseas to deal with emergency medical care for anyone but Rogers without his own stalwart heart breaking. Although a lot of other medics had given him shit over it he remained stubbornly convinced that working in either a hospital or a sanitarium would be bad for both of them, that he believed germs in such places could travel where others thought impossible. Maybe...hey, maybe if he lucked into the right crowd, he could get a job taking care of some rich old empty shell of a person, just day shifts, no live-ins. Had to be _someone_ in New York City more comfortable having a man for a nurse than a woman, especially a fairly brawny six-footer of a man who no longer had much by way of a sight-triggered or smell-triggered gag reflex, and there had to be a way to find them. If that didn't work, his military combat training could probably get him a job as a bouncer or a security guard, or his size and strong back could land him up with teamsters or longshoremen.

Things like the possibility of someday moving away from New York, somewhere with dry air and milder winters. And not just for Steve; Bucky realized early on in those couple of days to think while his best friend slept off the worst of a mild bout of lung trouble that Rogers was really his last point of attachment to Brooklyn, or anywhere else in the city for that matter. Steve had no family left whose names he knew, and the few Bucky had left behind had mostly moved away from the hectic pace of wartime big-city life. And the Alps had taught him _more_ than enough about winter to last him a lifetime. Maybe, if he could just talk Stevie into it, they could actually live somewhere that didn't ride out every damn winter looking and often smelling like a dirty sock pile and turn into a steaming swamp every August.

Things like what an _amazing_ artist the scrawny blond was, once he found the sketchbook stash and looked through several including the oldest and newest. He put everything meticulously back in exact order, having found himself curiously sure that it would embarrass the holy hell out of Steve to find out the bigger man actually did have a clue how much time had been spent watching him. What he had not expected was that as the dates on the sketchbooks got more recent, his presence on the pages had been fading. It finally struck him that Rogers must have thought, especially after the house fire, that he'd never see Bucky again. Maybe it had hurt him too much to keep drawing Barnes from memory when it wasn't unrealistic of Steve to have thought that might be all he'd have left, or maybe he'd gotten past their tightly entwined roots and had been symbolically letting go so he could move on to some other future, and the brunet wasn't sure which possibility his stomach was less fond of any time he mulled it over.

Things like that day in the woods, oh God he had hoped to forget that day...even if only to keep the wrong name from slipping his sleep if he were dreaming hot the way he sometimes did even in the trenches, or the couple of rounds he'd duked out with the flu during his service. Things too like his discovery overseas that for him a kiss was a kiss, nobody got preggers from sodomy, and that on the relatively frequent occasions when some sweet provincial farmer's offspring made it clear they'd sure be glad to thank a handsome Allied soldier, this particular soldier hadn't really cared whether he watched lipstick or a mustache sliding along his dick in some comparatively safe corner.

Things like maybe, if he was courageous enough to admit how he felt to Steve and careful enough to keep it from the rest of the world...

_Poor li'l wheezer,_ Barnes mused late into one night when Rogers's breathing was finally sounding less harsh, _if the shock don't kill him I'll have to be sure I don't fall on him. But oh, Stevie, you grew up so isolated and fierce, so talented and noble **without** three-quarters of the love a man our age shoulda seen._ He didn't feel himself yawn, and his heavy eyelids kept him from noticing the tiny stir of motion from the cot he'd pulled a chair up next to just like every night back home so far. _I wonder if you're up to hearing just how bad I wanna see what you could be with those hidden angel-wings my Ma always swore you had lifted up on the love I truly do want to set to blaze freely..._ And as he drifted off, it was on only his deepest instincts that he closed his hand over the smaller, bonier one that had sought it out in the dark.

He woke late, still slumped in the chair, baffled by the smell of eggs and bacon until he noticed the bed was empty. Then he remembered, after a single ugly internal lurch, that only when he was recuperating did Steve like greasy breakfast foods and staggered to his feet. Not to go leap in on the cooking chores; he'd learned a long time before the war that any shred of independence Rogers could dig up after being sick was something the scrawny blond would defend to the bitter end. Sure, half the damn borough seemed to know his name and consider him one of the nicest guys just ever, but Barnes knew what kind of weapons the other man could fashion out of determination, bullheaded stubbornness, and a rarely-seen well of selfish intentions.

Bucky did amble into the kitchen a few minutes later, teeth brushed, hair combed, a passable grin on his face. Steve, busy at the stove with his usual grace and precision, looked tired and ribby but not so bad as Barnes had seen him a hundred times before. “Bacon and eggs, you must be feeling better.”

“Little.” He sounded shy and nervous, the way he had when they'd been so much younger and just starting to build a friendship. Bucky had started being a big kid for his age pretty young, and it had taken a while for Rogers to trust there would be no bullying the way the other, older boys liked in his own case. “Your back's gonna have nasty words for you, sleeping in your chair.”

“I learned to sleep just about anywhere. My back doesn't complain much.”

“Oh. Right.” _Holy Hell, I never realized how much I missed that silly blush of his._

“'Sokay, Stevie. Both of us got a lot to learn.”

“Guess so,” Rogers mused warily, serving up breakfast as soon as the bacon was the way they both liked it.

“You sure you're okay?” Barnes asked when half his plate was empty and there had only been poorly-held sidelong glances in place of conversation.

“Well, I'm eating, so I must be.” And with that, he refused to speak again until after the table had been cleared and the dishes washed in their old ballet of Bucky soaping and rinsing, Steve drying and putting away. There were a couple of moments when Rogers had a very familiar hint of contentment about him while they worked, but the moment his hands were empty he was lost at sea again. His best friend had gone back to the table to sit, but the room was small and the big brunet had a long reach, so when Steve tried to dart past it was pretty easy to snag him by a bony wrist. The contact seemed to lock the blond up completely.

“Speakin' of eating...ya look like something you don't wanna talk to me about is chewing you up pretty bad. You won't get better under that kind of stress. As a medic **and** a friend I'm gonna have to advise you to spit out whatever burr's down your britches.” Much to his astonishment, when he tugged ever so lightly on that bony wrist, Rogers just kind of silently flowed right into his lap. There he sat very still, eyes fixed on nothing, clearly wrestling himself into trying to speak.

When he did finally lift his chin, he had that brave set to the corners of his mouth and the deliberately unflinching gaze that spoke in silence of his willingness to wade into any risk. Praying he was reading those signs right, Bucky let his own mouth curl into a grin that had gotten him sucked off a lot already in his life, then swung his free hand up to the back of Steve's head and leaned them into a slow-starting kiss. It was Rogers who broke back from it, but not to flee. “You sure, Buck? I'm doing better, you could go pick up a dame easy enough. Kinda surprised you didn't come home with a wife and a kid, actually.”

“Steve, you fuckin' little punk, I know I told you I needed you to be here to bring me home, needed my lodestone to draw me in. Like a magnet and iron filings, we are. Where'd you get the idea that I wouldn't still _need_ you if I didn't always _love_ you?” Any incoming sass was cut off when he swung Rogers around so the smaller man was astride his lap, then pulled them belly-to-belly for another kiss, still slow but this time much hotter. Pants-rearranging hotter for both of them, it turned out, but still sweet as a cool spring on a summer day. “I might have to go pick up dames now and then,” he panted a few minutes later when they paused, “just to keep up appearances, but ain't no dame called me back across the Atlantic. Ain't no dame I ever met yet I'd wanna wake up to more than once, and none I'd wanna bring here where it already feels like _our home_. And ain't no dame, in no country I've seen yet, **ever** did me half so good with her mouth as you did that one day. Which, yeah, means as soon as I think you're in good enough shape, if you wanna try that again I'll be happy to enjoy letting you. And it means if I ever marry a dame it will be to keep you safe. And it means yeah, I'm sure.”

Really, he had been planning to screw his formidable courage to the sticking point and leave to look for day work once the blond's breath stopped rattling in his chest so badly. Absolutely, one hundred percent intended to get his ass out the door and come home wearing the pride of a working man like a crown. All adult, all business, ready to start a shift on the spot once he knew his secret heart and soul to be safe at home alone.

Except that after his little invitation, Steve kissed him again, this time needy and heated and spit-slick, honest and slightly inept because this time he was sober and impossible to resist, the little shit. It was just so easy to fall into the moment for both of them, and once they remembered that everyone else in the building did have day jobs there was no stopping Bucky from wrapping his beloved in a tight hug, one arm across those narrow jagged shoulders and the other under what had to be the boniest adult ass in Brooklyn. It was even easier for them to fall into a heap that nearly collapsed Rogers's dilapidated cot.

The biggest surprise didn't turn out to be mismatched intentions, because both men knew by now that Barnes meant everything he said to the love of his sweet young life. It didn't turn out to be comfort levels; Bucky had set his own thoughts on the matter straight long since and had acquired a startling amount of relevant experience.

No, the biggest surprise was that when they were both finally naked, Steve didn't find the specks and streaks of shrapnel scarring off-putting in the least. Bucky had caught quite a lot of small pieces from a grenade behind and to his right, and had been twisting to fling a comrade to safety when it had gone off, so he'd ended up painted from about his nipples on down in weird stripes of scars around voids caused mostly by other parts of his fairly brawny frame being in the way.

“Really?” the blond smirked when the revelation of fear of rejection finally got choked out in the middle of the bigger man twisting and thrusting through a sincere and skilled handie that had already gone on at least twice as long as the veteran had expected himself to last. “Ain't **stupid** , jerk. You don't look at me and see nothing but the hacking and the wheezing and the list of things I'm not supposed to be able to do. Never did, didja? Shame on you, never thinking you might've taught me a valuable lesson or two along the way. Scars ain't who you are, Buck, any more than pneumonia's who I am. Ain't right anyway, judging people just on how they look.”

Barnes had no verbal answer for that, but it did provoke a strong reaction. Without a sound, he twisted and shoved a little, ignoring faint protests to pin Rogers on his narrow back. At last, after much playful wiggling, he found the few words that were perfect for the moment. “Ain't tried this before, but gotta be a first time for everything,” the brunet grinned wickedly. “Wanted to a couple times but wanted you to be first more...” Steve didn't pack nearly the caliber the veteran did, as Bucky was known to joke, and just maybe that made it easier the first time he closed that sweetly wicked smirk of his around another man's cock.

Steve didn't scream like a man being murdered, but he did loose a howl that made them even more grateful the rest of the place was deserted this time of day. They spent the rest of the workday alternating between scrounging up snack food and making out with one of Bucky's ears on alert for the sound of any of the doors in the building closing behind someone returning for the night.

As for the scars, Barnes stopped hating them forever after one sweet tipsy birthday celebration at home—his birthday, because they never stayed home on the Fourth of July—when Rogers broke out a set of very nice ink pens he'd saved a long time to get and had drawn entire constellations in the scarred spots, making up stories about them as he went and insisting on missing none of the damaged areas. Bucky had a good enough memory to jot down some details of the shapes and stories he liked best later, while Steve slept off the light drinking using Bucky's flank for a pillow.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's all the formatting I've got time for. Chapters 8-11 will be up tomorrow.


	8. Chapter 8

Not a week after they'd settled their intentions about each other, Rogers returned from school with that weird somber fearful look he got sometimes when huge dealings were afoot. Bucky had already promised to make cocoa as a rare treat; milk and chocolate were hard to afford, though the sugar was getting easier to find. When the door closed in the other room, Barnes got no answer to his perky little chirp of greeting from his post at the stove, something Steve often heckled him over—telling him it was no wolf-whistle, suggesting he take up learning bird calls, half a dozen smartass replies that would've gotten him beaten to a bloody pulp on the street failed to be heard.

When Bucky turned with worry gathering in his expression, though, Steve was already sitting at the table, pale and nervous.

“There's a show going up in a gallery,” Rogers managed. “Someone came by the school last week to talk to all the teachers, guess they want one piece from every student.”

“Well, we're going to have to go see in person how yours stacks up,” Barnes perked. He had unmatched access to the blond's beloved sketchbooks these days, but had seen very little of his more complex classwork since he tended to leave such things at the school where they had safer storage.

“Y'not gonna like what they picked of mine,” was all Steve mumbled.

“What? Pull it together, boyo. When have I ever not liked your work?” And that much was true; Bucky hadn't liked the subject matter or style of every single thing that flowed from those bony little hands onto paper, but he made damn sure to look at every one long enough to find something he _did_ like about it. “There gonna be a big opening night gala?”

“More like a punchbowl that'll taste like sweetened horse piss, a whole gaggle of girls and their overprotective mothers, and a dire shortage of tact.”

“Whatcha gonna wear?”

“I'm not **going** , Buck.”

“The hell you're not,” Barnes perked back, with that little corner-curl grinning thing he did in full view. That was the hardest grin to resist, but Rogers managed, setting his jaw and trying so earnestly to put a big old growl in his next words the way his friend so often did. One thing for sure, Steve could pull a much bigger growl out of his narrow ribs and shallow breathing than most people would expect.

“Don't bully me, Bucky. Not going.”

“Then tell me what I'm wearing, because I am. I want to see this. I _will_ go alone if you make me, Steve.”

“What, can't wait to see me walk with you into another room full of people judging me weak and insufficient for the one tiny sliver of myself their eyes actually take in?” Steve snapped, and oh boy did that explain a lot. That had been a concise description of what it had felt like to try to go on double dates that usually turned into one girl with Bucky, the other on the prowl, and Rogers forgotten to slink home alone again. Barnes wasn't sure he was ever going to entirely forgive himself for obliviously inflicting that misery on someone he loved.

“There will be one person in that room who's seen more of you than skills and sickness, Stevie. _That's_ why I'm going. With or without you. I'll know which one's yours, you know, because I'll see you shinin' right out of it no matter what the picture is.”

“Great,” Rogers moaned bitterly. “Our first actual date on the sly, and this is your plan. How exactly do I explain you?” Oh, he knew to mistrust _that_ rolling chuckle.

“How do you explain me now?”

“No one knows about you. They all think I'm doing better with my health because it's getting dry again and because...I told 'em a long-lost relative left me enough to rent a room for a year. Just enough.” No details meant no prying questions, no need for lies to try to remember.

“Well, then, that's easy. We give 'em enough truth to shut 'em up. I'm a war vet down on his luck, a medic with no blood family to come home to, someone you knew around town before the draft. I needed a job and a place to stay now I'm home, and when I'm not day-shifting for Mister Van Der Whatsisface I help you out around here, help pay the bills and all, do the heavy lifting, try to keep you on your feet, the usual. Enough of the truth it'll probably keep us outta Hell a little longer.”

“You really want to show up as my **nurse**?”

“Only if you're with me. Otherwise I just tell 'em I'm a friend of a family or that I liked the colors I saw through the window or whatever bullshit I can make up.” He was an excellent liar on the little things, a quality the blond didn't always like. No number of repetitions of 'sometimes soldiers gotta do bad things to fight the good fight' worked, either. Steve just basically sucked at anything resembling a moral or ethical grey area unless it was the vast gulf between his respect for even the blue laws and how he behaved when their doors were locked and blinds drawn. Rogers knew how to keep details close and behave himself in public, but in private he was usually horny as a damn jackrabbit. “But I'm goin' and if you try to _stop_ me I'll tickle you into an asthma attack, then tuck your bedcorners so tight you can't get out without my help.” He'd done it before when they had minor disagreements; the habit went all the way back to just after they'd met.

They arrived at the opening a few days later together. Steve was grateful that he wasn't actually having his best night, because that gave him an excuse to be leaning as heavily as he dared on Bucky's strong arm. Rogers was wearing his beloved blue pea-coat to keep the faint evening chill out of his chest, but Barnes had wisely chosen not to match, not to stand out like that tonight, choosing instead of his own blue beauty to wear his beat-up uniform coat—with the medic insignia he was so proud of now worn shining brightly where one of Helena's 'cousins' had sewn it to the lapel like a fancy gentleman's pin. A brief hush swept the room before one of the few people Bucky recognized, one of the teachers, pounced from out of the slow-growing crowd.

“Well, my gracious, look at you! I never thought you'd come,” she clucked sweetly over Steve, who flushed but didn't try to bat the attention away like he would at home. By her accent, Barnes guessed she was probably Dutch. “And who's this you're holding onto? I think maybe I have seen him meet you at the school, yes?”

“Oh, ah, right, Mrs. DeGroot, this is James. I've known him a long time, and he came home from the war with no family, no home to sleep in, and no plans for his medic training.”

“Moved myself right on in when he got a place, I did,” Barnes grinned under her not at all friendly appraisal. “Workin' days now, helpin' an older fella who can't walk no more, and Steve here offered me a spare room if I'd help a little with the bills and housework. It's kinda nice, really, havin' a job and a place to live, and his health never did bother me none.” He was talking beneath himself, which always pissed Rogers right off, but the blond could see his slick patter was working (and so was that mischievous grin, _dammit **James**_...) on the teacher, who now appeared mollified. With Mrs. DeGroot, mollified was a lot better than many people ever got.

When Mrs. DeGroot had moved on to mingle, Steve refused to go find a seat, insisting they get the part he wasn't looking forward to out of the way. First they had to find the painting, which took a while because of how the extra hanging spaces had been arranged. They looked at dozens of still-lifes of flowers and fruits and vases, cute animals frolicking in barnyards or sitting rooms, lazily bucolic landscapes, and austere portraits before Bucky heard it—that tiny hitch-and-wheeze that automatically prompted him to pull the inhaler out of his uniform jacket. Once Steve was breathing clearly again, Barnes watched him a moment and then turned to look where his beloved would not.

They'd given it a place on the biggest, best-lit wall, meaning the teachers at the school had juried it and determined its place there was earned. It was much bigger than Bucky expected, had to be three feet wide and almost two tall, and in vivid, almost Impressionistic color unlike the sketches and studies he was used to seeing but still aching stylistic familiarity in lines and shading. Slowly, he turned back to Rogers, who flushed bright. “While I was gone?” was all the bigger man asked, and a nod was all the answer he needed.

The painting was of the train station where they'd parted so unwillingly what seemed like a lifetime gone past now, though it had been painted with only wisps and hints of mist rather than that heavy, cold fog. The station itself was actually doing just fine, had even been renovated some after the war, but the painting showed it looking more like that boardinghouse, gutted to a husk amid a riot of untended greenery, looking across the empty rows of tracks and platforms to the main terminal building near either sunrise or sunset. Its title was _Used to be Our Favorite Place_ and, though no price was visible, its tag listed it as for sale, an honor reserved only for the best ten percent according to the jury of teachers and administrators. Barnes studied it a very long time before turning back to his friend, who was about to chew his lower lip to rags in his tension.

“Told you you wouldn't like it,” he muttered, turning away and breaking for the punch table before anything else could be said. By the time Bucky caught up with him, Rogers was actually slipping out the front door to duck down the side of the building. To his astonishment, Barnes went with him rather than try to talk him out of bailing. The surprise only deepened when the brunet pulled a flask from an inner pocket of his coat, taking a big swig before pouring a generous jigger out into his companion's punch cup.

“All of it,” the medic ordered, and that tone always got obedient results. “Jesus, Stevie...that picture...”

“Knew you'd hate it,” the blond muttered, chasing his despair with the last dregs of punch and cheap vodka that brought a brief grimace to wrinkle his nose.

“I absolutely _do not_ hate it, you fucking punk,” Bucky growled, startling the smaller man quite badly. “I hate that you would **think** that. I hate that it did used to be one of our favorites but my leaving made you see it like that. I hate those fucking bullies who started a war I had to leave you for in the first place, probably why I got so good at killin' them from a safe distance. And I am one hundred percent prepared to hate _anyone_ who doesn't like that painting except you.” While he'd spoken into that wide-eyed surprised expression, he'd also taken advantage of Steve's inability to hold liquor—since he nearly never drank it—and the deepening dusk to maneuver them further away from the front, the lights, the sidewalk where bright colors and sparkling chatter were starting to draw in spectators off the street. By the time he'd backed Rogers into a slip of shadow big enough for both of them, the booze was working its ways.

Otherwise Steve might have fought him like a wildcat when Bucky whipped his uniform coat over both of them to hide that vivid blue merino the blond had been clutching like a security blanket, hiding that glory to pull the smaller man close for a long, slow, loving kiss in a very dangerous place. He did _try_ to put up a fight, worried about being seen until Barnes let him go long enough to whisper in his ear that the more fuss he kicked up the more likely they'd get caught.

“Still gonna get us caught you don't knock that off,” Steve whined under his breath a moment later. He was a sucker for having his earlobes played with, and for any kind of soft touch on his neck or throat, and his companion was only too happy to let his mobile mouth take that much advantage before he backed off to let them calm down before they tried going back in. “Lucky for me this coat could hide a whole Christmas tree if it had to.” Steve was obliquely referring to the hard-on currently pressed into his companion's thigh from behind layers of cloth, and when the look he got made him twitch there, Bucky's grin only got worse.

“Careful,” Barnes teased, not at all in jest. “My coat might not be as good as yours for that.” Neither was surprised that Steve, though he did thrive on the attentions he got at home, wasn't the only one hard. For once, Rogers moved faster than Bucky could follow...and for once it was the blond putting them at terrible, glorious risk just like that day in the woods, hitting his knees with a low moan, hoping the shadows would keep him hidden while he deftly undid Barnes's pants.

And as always, there was that one trick that just undid the brunet, silencing his intent to protest, twisting his worries into the kind of noises that he had to clamp his own strong hand over his mouth to keep from letting free much too loudly for a place like this. This time, for a real rarity, Steve was the aggressive one, never letting the bigger man really catch his breath while he busted out all but that one of the sweetest, slickest, hottest tricks that little mouth could do to Bucky's easily-alerted dick. It wasn't meant to last long, and it didn't.

Once again, it was all Bucky could do to keep from screaming like a man being murdered when he felt that one unbearably erotic touch no one else had been able to duplicate thus far...the gentle poke of Steve's nose up against the skin below his navel as Barnes unloaded like the stud horse girls had so often called him.

By the time Bucky was ready to try going back into the show, Rogers was pleasantly tiddly enough to not only relax, but to explain away the flush and bright eyes when anyone asked if he was okay.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dutch words courtesy of Google Translate, so take 'em with a grain of salt.

It turned out the alleyway blowjob was not going to be the biggest surprise to come from the night. The show ran for a week, at the end of which Steve went to Mrs. DeGroot to get his painting back.

“ _Nee, jongen_ ,” she squeaked in her family's native Dutch—Bucky's guess had been entirely right. “No, young man,” she tried again a moment later. “You're not getting it back.” She slid a thin envelope across the table. “Only five pieces in the show sold, and that's the only one I know for certain wasn't bought by a family member afraid to see the painter cry at the reception. Yours, _jongen_ , yours is going up in the workspace of a very wealthy man, a room where he deals with wealthy clientele. I'm taking you out of the charcoals classes.”

“What?” He seemed not just distraught and confused now but genuinely anxious at the sudden turn of subject.

“Well, for one thing they're not good for your asthma. People complain about your coughing, but that is only part of why. I want to ask you to concentrate your efforts on pencil, ink, and most particularly paints—oil and water. Your pastel works are fine, but it is your line work and paintings that glow brightest with talent.” Rogers was sitting with his mouth hanging slightly open, clearly astonished. “I am recommending you for advanced placement in pencils, intermediate in paints, and beginner in inks. Your scholarship will cover materials because of the things you will not be required to have for other classes. Is that acceptable?”

“Well, um, I, ah, I mean you're the teacher.”

“And you, Steven, are a much more gifted student than you think. In fact, I would be confident to _weddenschap_ is the word where I come from...wager! Yes, a wager, a bet. I would bet with confidence that you are one of the most talented students in your year in the areas where you are strong. And in this, you are strong, Steven. The spirit that drives your hand when you have a pencil or a brush in it is _krachtig_ , we call it. Powerful, potent, robust. All your vigor, all your strength, they are not in your body but bound deep into your heart and maybe deeper into your talent. I will not see you wasted. I will speak to the Dean of Students and try to get your classes set up for next semester, but until then you are not to attend charcoals regardless. Martha may not be at all happy to find out it won't be her painting hanging in her father's work office.” That shocked him to stillness, though later there would be heartfelt thanks. Not only was charcoal his least favorite medium—aside from the constant irritation of his asthma, he _hated_ the way the pencils dragged and scratched and caught on the paper rather than the smooth glide of graphite or his beloved, expensive colored pencils—but Martha, heir to a massive Old World fortune, viciously resented anyone with actual talent and had been spoken to repeatedly for her habit of bullying all the smaller, frailer students like Rogers. She had, however, reached the limit of her abilities in painting and inks, so their overlap would be minimal if there was any at all.

He thanked her in a daze until she giggled and told him to take the day off to celebrate. He looked, quite frankly, stunned at the very thought. “ _Jongen_ , you deserve to celebrate! Your piece not only sold first, it was the one I heard the most talk about. People liked it a lot, _jongen_. Maybe it was not the prettiest place or happiest moment captured for all those works, but it did draw emotion from nearly everyone who gave it more than a glance. At the very least, have that _oppassend_ medic of yours shepherd you for a nice dinner, maybe a drink even.”

“O-oh...pah...send?” Rogers sounded out the longer unfamiliar word carefully.

“In my native Dutch, it means well-behaved, steady, and sweet all at once. I did speak with James a bit at the show while you were otherwise occupied. He is more than just a soldier, or a medic, or a very nice young man.” She saw the instant panic rise in Steve's wide blue eyes. “He is a muse to you, I would expect. I believe you may also be a muse to him. James is much more a poet than he believes himself to be, though I was surprised how he reacted when I said as much, that he heard it for the compliment it was intended to be. If you truly want to repay his loyalty and his faith in you, encourage his words. In his hands, someday, a thesaurus might as well be like a paintbrush in yours. Perhaps someday it will be my joy to hold in my own hands a book full of his words and your art. I believe _schoon_ is the word I would choose to describe such a book—clean, fair to the eye like _vlinders_ , butterflies, in the sun, and above all beautiful. Like the two of you were when I saw you talk together.” That panic returned, confirming her suspicion.

“Relax, _jongen_. The door of my office locks and the walls are thick because I often have to bring wayward young ladies in here for frank discussions. Sometimes about other wayward young ladies. I do not judge people the way you look afraid of, Steven. You do love him, yes? Beyond the loyalty of childhood, I think.”

“Far beyond,” was all Rogers could choke out. No point in trying to lie to her, not when she had it all so precisely nailed **and** he was still a terrible liar. After he took a deep breath and still found no judgment in her gaze, though, it actually felt better deep down in his gut to have told someone the truth at last. That, he knew, was the worst part of being in love the way he was—the simple fact that he couldn't brag it up or strut around or even visibly respond to Bucky's presence the way he did in private, where the other man's stalwart heart was entirely Steve's.

“I think no one else at the gallery saw that in you two, as it was a sutble and quick thing I saw. Most of them were too busy with their own business, but since you are one of my star pupils you were my business. I will of course tell no one.”

“But...if you saw so easily,” the scrawny student managed, squirming against the urge to fold in on himself.

“You don't leave home much other than to come to school, this I know. James works during your school hours and is no doubt too tired most nights for carousing, yes?” A slow nod. “It was not just you I watched in that conversation, Steven. I am deeply impressed that he is in so few of your works, because a wicked old tramp like me sees much, including what you leave out. And now that I have seen the two of you speak like there was no one else in that room, I see clearly that he loves you too. Surely he can shepherd a delicate young artist out to celebrate the first big sale of a work?”

“Yeah,” Rogers admitted slowly, nodding even though his blush had yet to fade. “Before the war his hobby was pulling me outta fights I kept picking on the streets, mostly with guys disrespecting dames—girls. Ladies. He knows how to keep me out of a lot of trouble.”

“Steven, I mean it. Celebrate. Take him with, so he will not worry, so he knows he is important to you, so you will be safer from bullies. But I must advise you continue to leave him out of your assignments. Maybe someday will come a time when you can paint everything you love in him, but right now is much too dangerous for that.”


	10. Chapter 10

Many years later, Mrs. DeGroot received a package whose return address was somebody calling themselves PJ Arts, Inc., apparently in a small town in California. Inside were a hand-painted card and a smaller gift-wrapped package. The watercolor on the card was a meticulously gorgeous landscape, sunset along the Pacific coastline, and the penmanship inside was exquisite.

_'We are very sorry this had to arrive belatedly for your retirement, but leave it to my Stevie to catch his first bout of pneumonia in actual years just in time to delay finishing the last few works both of us were preparing for this, little Punk that he can be.'_ At first, the seemingly random capitalization surprised her. _'He says this book was your idea, and I absolutely believe that. We could think of no one better to entrust with the first copy off the presses.'_ Underneath that were two signatures, the messier of which she recognized as Rogers's attempt at handwriting. The other one read _'James, who is sometimes a huge Jerk.'_ It took her only a moment to put it together, that their boyhood playful insults had become nicknames and in turn formed the base of the business name. Even the arthritis gnawing at her knuckles did not get in the way of unwrapping what indeed turned out to be a book.

It was beautiful, full of Steve's paintings and inks paired with James's mostly freeform poetry, packed with compositions in both that took her breath away and often with personal messages hand-written under the poems. And, of course, the frontispiece was autographed. The dedication nearly brought tears in its wake: _'To Mrs. DeGroot, who showed us the way to the courage to set all our butterflies free.'_ The title was _Vlinders_ In The Sun: Vignettes From A Quiet Life. Her favorite painting was of James nearly in full-front, obviously shirtless and being tickled like crazy but trying not to move. Its title was _Actually They Are Tiny Fiends._

The note hand-penned under the poem on the opposite page explained that this glorious, almost surreal moment had happened during one of their woodland hikes when they had paused upside a tiny creek for a rest, and the title was a direct quote from Bucky about the tickling. Steve had painted him from the collarbones up, catching all the life and vigor and happiness on display, truly everything he loved best in the other man, while Barnes tried not to frighten off easily a dozen butterflies that had him on the verge of hyperventilating. Most were the tiny ones with blue or brown tops and spotted silvery undersides but there were a few huge yellow-and-black swallowtails and a couple of in-between sized ones in geometric patterns of gold and orange and white framed by intricate black, and all had found his sweat absolutely irresistible and were climbing all over him without fear.


	11. EPILOGUE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ao3 completely changed my views on fanfiction and the people who write it. Ao3 (and, in quite a few cases, associated Tumblr accounts) turned me from an anxiety-challenged, frustrated bookworm unable to keep their attention on written words for more than about 2,000 of them into someone who's read OhCaptainMyCaptain's 'After Hours' like six times. I dove into Ao3 face-first and didn't really come up for air until I started to publish 'Vlinders, Butterflies, In The Sun'. This piece, which without this epilogue is somewhere around 14,000 words if memory serves.  
> I have 3 other fics 'pipelined' at this time, plus a project that could support a dozen writers in at least 3 months of daily one-shots. The A/B/O dynamics fic, which is close to ready to publish, is already around 30,000 words and likely needs 10,000 more. The one ready to publish is a WinterFrost unlike any of the others I've enjoyed here thus far and is well over 13,000 words. The big one, which is also in the worst shape in terms of finish work and chapter ordering, is nevertheless around 28,000 words and could end up clearing 40,000 without cracking much of a sweat.  
> I just don't think anyone wants to read them.

The only other customer in the little cafe was clearly another tourist, this one on his way through town. The only waitress on duty was taking his order, but she paused to chirp at the very old lady and her obvious caretaker that they could be seated anywhere and she'd be there as soon as she could.

“Take...take your time,” the old lady managed, but the shake in her voice wasn't about her age. While her caretaker selected a table and gently steered her toward it, her still-sharp eyes were roving the walls. This was how she knew they'd found the right place...instead of the usual cheesy knockoff prints beginning to be so common, this place was full of original drawings and paintings. One wall had presented the irresistible option of a mural, and it was that space that had hooked her attention first.

It was a simple scene, a small patch of meadow atop a fairly small seaside cliff, and what made it stand out was the immense flock of assorted butterflies. Closer examination of a peculiar dark spot at the bottom was also a delight—it wasn't an error or a flaw in the wall, it was a meticulously researched list of all the different butterflies shown...and the title of the piece, which told her she was absolutely in the right place. _Vlinders In The Sun_ , it was called, and she knew that precision handwriting perfectly well. Then the waitress's voice caught her attention away.

“Yessir, we do have original art. A few are for sale if you're interested, but most are not.”

“Nah, if I took one home I'd probably just be bringin' the weirdness with me.”

“We're not that bad a place, really.”

“No, just weird, little lady. Ya see the darndest things in California these days. Glad a good ol' boy like me's just passin' through.”

“Oh yeah? What'd you see, then?”

“Well, if you can imagine it, I saw this big brawny fella wearing something that looked like a backpack, a saddle, and a draft horse harness got thrown in a blender. Had some teenage kid strapped in like he was a riding horse, too. Now I don't know the back story and I don't think I need to.” Recognizing a dismissal, however offhand, the waitress put his order ticket up for the cook and then ambled over to the two newcomers.

“We're tourists too,” began Rizzo, the caretaker.

“Where you headed? There's a lot to see around here that just gets skipped over, so let me know and if you've got the time I can make some recommendations.”

“We have found our destination,” the old lady smiled, her Dutch accent fainter than in earlier years but still lilting along.

“Ma'am, are you all right? Not to be rude but you look like you might cry.”

“Only for joy, _jongedame_ , truly only for joy. I already know what I would like if it is on your menu.”

“We can give anything a try.”

“Ideally, please, I would like a soft-boiled egg, two slices of your wonderful California sourdough bread with butter on the side, and coffee with cream. Giacomo, what would you like?” Her caretaker ordered up a pretty standard meat-and-eggs breakfast, but also requested the local sourdough on the side.

Once the other customer had been served his breakfast, the waitress stopped again to try to slake her intense curiosity—the old lady was still studying the walls with a telltale misty little grin, which the local girl took for the kind of quiet amazement their decor usually generated.

“We do kind of have the best walls in the county, we think,” she smiled. “So what brings you to our tiny corner of the world?”

“Your walls, _jongedame_. I'm sorry...young lady. So often the words slip my mind, since English was actually my fourth language to learn. I know what the mural title means— _vlinder_ is Dutch for butterfly.”

“So...did you hear about the art somewhere? We don't get a lot of publicity, partly because so few of the actual paintings in frames are for sale.”

“A wise choice. The gentleman, he described two men?” The girl nodded. “Tell me, the one he called brawny...about six feet tall, dark hair, blue eyes, and a smile that could charm the sun over the horizon? And the teenager, I think, is no teenager. Thin, blond, also blue-eyed, and the painter of all this beauty?”

“Do...do you know them?”

“Long ago I did, if only briefly. Little Steven, he was a student at the artists' academy where I taught for three decades, and one of the most talented we ever got. By the sound of it, he still has his _oppasend_ , his medic, James, who is also a poet as well as a veteran. I was the one who told Steven what _vlinders_ meant, though I must say I never expected it to stick that deeply. Then again, I think perhaps only James knows what the deepest parts of Steven are like.”

“Do they know you're here?”

“No,” the caretaker answered when his charge had to pause for a sip of water. “We weren't sure we could find this place, so we didn't want hopes up that could be dashed.”

“I see. Oops, there's your beverages. Let me get those and then I'll find out from the cook how long your wait will be.” She brought their drinks, then took the other customer his food, and then disappeared into the back for a short moment—but not to talk to the cook.

“Rory, I need to use the office phone,” she told her day-shift supervisor, the only other employee in the building on this quiet morning. Given permission with a lazy wave of a hand, she dialed a familiar local number.

“PJ Arts,” came the equally familiar answer.

“Good morning, James. It's Lyla down at the restaurant. How's Steve today?”

“Doing great, actually,” Barnes perked. “A cup of coffee and a sunrise hike were exactly what he needed this morning. I can't talk long, though, because I need to feed us.”

“Bring him down here. I'll buy you both breakfast, but you gotta get here **quick**.”

“Lyla, what—” he only barely managed to start.

“No time for that. Come on down, would you?”

“Hey, Steve, we're goin' down to town for breakfast. I'll go warm up the car,” she heard him say before he could hang up the phone.

It wasn't a long drive, and the dull old clunker they used for bad weather and days when speed was of the essence pulled in just in time to park next to where the solitary tourist was just getting into his own ride; both took note as they disembarked of the luxury sedan with its New York plates as they walked past it. Both headed for the counter, oblivious to the customers who hadn't looked up from their casual conversation.

“So, Lyla, what's up?” it was Steve who asked, failing to note that across the room the old lady had stopped mid-sentence to turn their way.

“We got tourists who said they came all this way for this place.” 

"They _drove_ here from **New York** trying to find this cafe?” James seemed deeply surprised, especially when the waitress nodded, and that was when both men turned to the only occupied table. Barnes's eyes went wide and his jaw slack, but it was Steve who pulled in a sharply sudden breath before launching himself across the room to land next to the old lady. Both were squeaking in delight as she threw her arms around his narrow shoulders. When Bucky joined them, he sat across the table with the other caretaker.

“So you're the ones she loves so much,” Giacomo grinned. “Said since this might be her last big vacation trip, this was the place to find. I'm glad we made it.” His brown eyes warm, he hooked a thumb across the table where Steve and Mrs. DeGroot were happily chittering away about art and poetry and books and the life the two men had made here so far from everything they'd grown up with.

By the time Lyla had brought both locals their usual favorite meals, happy chittering had blown up into a four-part conversation full of joy and giggling. She'd known 'those two artsy queer weirdos' her whole life, but had rarely seen either smiling the way they were now. It made her glad she always kept two things close at hand: her autographed copy of _Vlinders_ In The Sun: Vignettes From A Quiet Life and a Polaroid camera. She loved showing off the book on slow days. Before Mrs. DeGroot and her caretaker left to trail the artist and the poet to their beautiful little studio home, the old lady was deeply honored to have been asked to add her signature to the other two in the book, and to have her picture taken with Steve beaming on one side and Bucky ever-so-subtly supporting her on the other, in front of the mural. Lyla took the picture twice, one copy for the tourist and another for the locals.

By the end of the year, a new painting hung behind the cash register, a lovely watercolor of the three of them and part of the mural, entitled _The Day Our Muse Came To Call._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know Ao3 is a massive community.  
> That is part of why I structured my approach the way I did: read borderline-obsessive amounts, begin writing, read even more, create an account, leave kudos and comments, bookmark particular favorites, make contact in assorted ways with other creators whose work has inspired me, and finally publish. The two most important (to me) cases of 'you have inspired me and I would like to include references to your art/writing in the notes on the applicable work' have both not only answered my query but been very positive—although since their works contributed to the big fic (a post-Age of Ultron Stucky piece), I doubt I'll be using those hugely appreciated permissions. After the comments I've left, only ONE author has replied with anything but a brush-off "Thanks for reading." That one, if they're reading this, deserves to know that the work of theirs we discussed will always, always be a favorite whether or not I ever publish here again.  
> I've tried to draw upon my experiences as a voracious reader with over thirty years' experience lugging actual paper books around wherever my life has taken me. Even when I had to briefly move out of my home country on 72 hours' notice to save my own life, and get to my new home by train, I took books, actual paper books. I've looked at what I do and don't like about all my bookmarked and favorite Ao3 works, what I read on Tumblr, what I find on Pinterest, everything I can think of that could possibly help me be an author worth reading.
> 
> ONE comment on my first ever published fiction anywhere would have been nice.  
> Bookmarks and kudos don't tell an author what readers think. READERS tell an author what readers think. So the absence of any commentary, positive or negative, about this endeavor that I've given a pretty big chunk of my year to so far, well, that's what they mean when they say 'sometimes silence speaks louder than a scream'.  
> I don't feel like shouting into the darkness any more. I wish I'd been able to come up with something anyone felt was worth saying anything about. The single worst thing an author can do is BORE their readers, so I will waste no more of your time.


End file.
